I know the Pioneer BD-205 is a Blu-ray burner but it's the only burner I have installed right now. I do have a Samsung DVD burner I can install but when I bought the Pioneer I removed it and only have the Pioneer installed right now. So on to the problem I'm having.

I guess this may be the blank media I'm using. A while back I bought a 5 pack of Memorex DVD+R DL 8x media at Office Depot and only 3 out of 5 burns were successful. I went back to get some different media but they only had the Memorex. I talked to the manager about the problem and he said that's all they carried but he gave me 50% off the second pack to try them again. So far in the second pack both of the burns I tried have failed so I'm not sure what to do, except install the Samsung and try again. But I thought I'd post this here and see if anyone has any ideas about getting the Pioneer BD-205 to burn them.

Most often the burn passes but the verification fails. I've used Nero 7 - 7.11.10.0 (latest update) and ImgBurn - 2.5.5.0 so I think I've covered my bases as far as software is concerned. I'll paste the Disc ID that DVD Identifer gave me below.

HA... It's RITEK so maybe that's the problem. I know their Blu-ray discs are a problem but is their DVD discs a problem too. I looked around and couldn't find any other brands of DVD DL locally so I may have to order some off the internet. I really wanted to get something done for my nephew but this is stopping me dead. Bummer. So if anyone had any ideas let me know. I suppose I'll just have to open up the case and install the Samsung and try it. But heck, shouldn't this high dollar Pioneer work if the Samsung would. I'm wondering if DVD burning isn't the best on a Blu-ray burner and I just need both installed. So let me know what you think. I'm off to Church right now and will check back this afternoon before I install the Samsung to try it.

OPPs... Almost forgot. The Pioneer had the 1.09 Firmware installed for all the burns. I just installed 1.11 but haven't tried burning with it. I didn't think it would fix the problem, but I seen the update and installed it.

Yes ritek is crap, sold as ritek, memorex and various other media. try burning at 4x or 6x and it might work.

ritek media codes come from various factories in Taiwan some batches are better then others.

the only "reliable" DL media is verbatim and tayo yuden. Verbatim reliability went down when they started making their DL media in Taiwan instead of Singapore. you still might be able to find some Singapore made media.

Tayo Yuden is hard to find, only DVD-R DL, made in Japan and sold under JVC

edit, samsung "might" work better. Not because its better or worse. the way burners burn is burner has to have a burn strategy in the firmware. each company to make a burn strategy they get a bunch of disc per each MID code. Basically they look how each media is burned and adjust the firmware accordingly.

problem with media like ritek is that there is a huge variance in quality, some might be good, some might be OK, and some is simply horrible, very poor quality assurance.
For example the ritek you might have might be closer to what samsung had when they adjusted the firmware, so it might burn better. while next batch you get might be closer to what pioneer had when they did their adjustment.

Yes ritek is crap, sold as ritek, memorex and various other media. try burning at 4x or 6x and it might work.

ritek media codes come from various factories in Taiwan some batches are better then others.

the only "reliable" DL media is verbatim and tayo yuden. Verbatim reliability went down when they started making their DL media in Taiwan instead of Singapore. you still might be able to find some Singapore made media.

Tayo Yuden is hard to find, only DVD-R DL, made in Japan and sold under JVC

edit, samsung "might" work better. Not because its better or worse. the way burners burn is burner has to have a burn strategy in the firmware. each company to make a burn strategy they get a bunch of disc per each MID code. Basically they look how each media is burned and adjust the firmware accordingly.

problem with media like ritek is that there is a huge variance in quality, some might be good, some might be OK, and some is simply horrible, very poor quality assurance.
For example the ritek you might have might be closer to what samsung had when they adjusted the firmware, so it might burn better. while next batch you get might be closer to what pioneer had when they did their adjustment.

Thanks. I knew I could count on you for a quick answer. I wish I knew that Memorex was RITEK before I bought the second batch because I would have ordered some Verbatim off the internet. I bought the second batch of Memorex a few weeks ago and didn't need it till yesterday when I first tried to create the disc for my nephew. I'll see if I can find some Tayo Yuden when I look on the internet for my next batch. Thanks for your input. Later today I'll put in the Samsung so maybe I can get the disc made at least.

OPPs... Almost forgot. Since I had so much trouble with the first batch of Memorex I burned the first disc yesterday at 2.4 x with Nero and the second disc this morning at 4x with ImgBurn. Both passed burn but failed to verify.

Hmmm thank for interesting tool to identify media, I have Lite-ON DVD recorder recorded on Imation 4x DVD-RW media bought from ebuyer.com 6 years ago but when I got same brand 2 years ago from ebuyer.com and the DVD recorder cant format or record it but can playback if burned or copied from the PC.

The Imation 4x DVD-RW media made from Taiwan worked fine can format and record on DVD recorder:

OPPs... Almost forgot. Since I had so much trouble with the first batch of Memorex I burned the first disc yesterday at 2.4 x with Nero and the second disc this morning at 4x with ImgBurn. Both passed burn but failed to verify.

Hmmm thank for interesting tool to identify media, I have Lite-ON DVD recorder recorded on Imation 4x DVD-RW media bought from ebuyer.com 6 years ago but when I got same brand 2 years ago from ebuyer.com and the DVD recorder cant format or record it but can playback if burned or copied from the PC.

It's a pretty good utility to have around. I found it this morning when I was googoling for BD205 DL problems. I ended up finding that tool in a forum talking about something else. But I downloaded it and it's a nice program to have around. There was another one too but it had a windows error so I uninstalled and deleted it.

Thanks for the tool I'll check it out and post the results. I threw the discs in the trash but the trash can is by my desk so I just pulled them out, no damage to either of them.

Okay, here's the deal. I built a system for my sister-in-law and since she lives with us, we're retired but she's still working for a little longer. None the less the system I built for her had two Samsung DVDs so I put the image on a USB hard drive and transfered it to her system and burned it there. (much easier than taking my system apart) The end result is the Memorex DVD+R DL 8x disc burned and verifed pefectly on her system using Nero. So it looks like the Pioneer BD-205 has some compatibilty problems with DVD+R DL discs. I also ran CDCheck on my system to see if the disc I burned on her system would read on my system in the BD-205 and it read all the way through without any errors. So it seems the BD-205 will read the Memorex okay but not write it. Bummer.

I downloaded the Supported Media List from Pioneer (FW108) and the RITEK is in it.

that is true, but you have to keep in mind that ritek media goes from horrible bad to ok, its probably the worst media when it comes to consistent reliability.

Good point. I didn't think about that. But none the less the Pioneer didn't work and the Samsung did on the same batch. So something is wrong in the write strategy of the Pioneer for RITEK DVD+R DL media. I forgot to say it in my last post but AnyDVD was not running during the burn or verify. Oh, off topic question for ya. I seen the BD-206 is available do you know what's new or better with it? Or maybe I should just google it and not be lazy

Here's the results for both of the Memorex DVD+R DL 8x discs I created, both were burned with the same ISO file. The first disc was burned on my computer using the Pioneer. The second disc was burned on my sister-in-laws computer using the Samsung. Both discs came out of the same 5 pack of Memorex discs. Since both discs came out of the same pack then it seems to me either the Samsung has a problem burning the Memorex discs or my particular Samsung has a problem. Thanks for letting me know about this tool, it definitely helped.

Good point. I didn't think about that. But none the less the Pioneer didn't work and the Samsung did on the same batch. So something is wrong in the write strategy of the Pioneer for RITEK DVD+R DL media. I forgot to say it in my last post but AnyDVD was not running during the burn or verify. Oh, off topic question for ya. I seen the BD-206 is available do you know what's new or better with it? Or maybe I should just google it and not be lazy

true, but keep in mind what i said before, ritek media batches vary. There is a chance that Pioneer might burn some ritek good, but samsung wouldn't.

When a ODD company makes a firmware they get bunch of disc for each MID type and adjust a firmware based on those disc. When Pioneer adjust firmware for batch A, those will burn ok, but then comes a slightly different batch C and those disc might not burn OK.

thats why ritek is not a good media, there is to big variance between batches.

true, but keep in mind what i said before, ritek media batches vary. There is a chance that Pioneer might burn some ritek good, but samsung wouldn't.

When a ODD company makes a firmware they get bunch of disc for each MID type and adjust a firmware based on those disc. When Pioneer adjust firmware for batch A, those will burn ok, but then comes a slightly different batch C and those disc might not burn OK.

thats why ritek is not a good media, there is to big variance between batches.

and 206 according to pioneer has a different power distribution.

Sure I know what you mean. I worked as a hardware and software engineer before I retired so I'm familiar with this type of problem, but it's difficult to ignore the fact that one burns and one fails. Even if I understand the issue I haven't tried to look up anything on how Pioneer deals with the differences in laser and head design for a combo bluray/dvd/cd burner. But I wonder if there's a problem there.